Subject: Bespoke installations: simple elegance of setup.exe when setup.ini is absent
From: <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Cc: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Apr 2005 14:02:35 +0100

About 3 years ago the then available setup.exe used to work as follows; for
some quite long period since, it didn't (the installation hung); now it's
back to its old (possibly unintended) functionality.

Or so it seems to me. Can anybody confirm?

To install Cygwin in full or in part, place all required *.bz2 in their
correct location under c:\MyCyg\release\ or (conveniently and repeatably) on
a CD under d:\MyCyg\release\. Do _not_ include any version of setup.ini
under c:\MyCyg\, where conventionally this file would be located. Run
setup.exe, choosing to "Install from Local Directory" identified as
[cd]:\MyCyg\. All the included packages will be shown under Misc. Click the
selector to change from "Default" to "Install" and away you go, to achieve a
full installation of your included packages.

Note: "all required *.bz2": this phrase of course is a can of worms and
unless the dependencies have been attended to by a previous use of
setup.ini, this method of installation carries with it the risk that some
packages will be installed whilst lacking necessary companions. But, if you
are sure what you want and that you are getting it, this method (which seems
to work) saves you any previously suggested hassle-rich approaches including
tedious repeated point and click selection of packages from a list of ?>
500, special management of installed.db or setup.ini, or the creation of
tailored local mirrors, copying from other media, careful use of mount and
umount, or combinations of these.

Useful for restricted/ tailored/ even non-current distributions, and when
you want to be sure that two or more installations are identical to one
another in all respects.

Fergus

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